What bothers me the most about the past GOP primaries was that two of the more successful and qualified governors Mitt Romney and Rick Perry felt the need to be something that they were not – hard core social cons instead of the pragmatic center-right people that they are. Romney’s advisers admitted that it was a mistake to do that.

An immigration strategy that helped Mitt Romney win the Republican primary likely cost him in the general election, a top adviser admitted in a postmortem.

In audio of a Harvard panel released on Monday morning, a group of top Romney strategists dissect the reasons their candidate fell short. At one point, someone in the audience asks whether the hard-line immigration positions Romney took during the primaries may have damaged his standing among the general electorate.

“I regret that,” campaign chief Matt Rhoades said after a pause.

by Jonah Goldberg

It’s hard for a lot of people, particularly on the right, to recognize that the conservative movement’s problems are mostly problems of success. But the Republican party’s problems are much more recognizable as the problems of failure, including the failure to recognize the limits of that movement’s success.

American conservatism began as a kind of intellectual hobbyists’ group with little hope of changing the broader society. Albert Jay Nock, the cape-wearing libertarian intellectual — he called himself a “philosophical anarchist” — who inspired a very young William F. Buckley Jr., argued that political change was impossible because the masses were rubes, goons, fools, or sheep, victims of the eternal tendency of the powerful to exploit the powerless.

Buckley, who rightly admired Nock for many things, rightly disagreed on this point. Buckley trusted the people more than the intellectuals. […….]

It took time. In an age when conservative books make millions, it’s hard to imagine how difficult it once was to get a right-of-center book published. Henry L. Regnery, the founder of the publishing house that bears his name, started his venture to break the wall of groupthink censorship surrounding the publishing industry. With a few exceptions, Regnery was the only game in town for decades.

[…….] It’s only in the legacy institutions — newspapers, the broadcast networks, and most especially academia and Hollywood — that conservatism is still largely frozen out. Nonetheless, conservatism is a mass-market enterprise these days, for good and for ill.

The good is obvious. The ill is less understood. For starters, the movement has an unhealthy share of hucksters eager to make money from stirring rage, paranoia, and an ill-defined sense of betrayal with little concern for the real political success that can come only with persuading the unconverted.

A conservative journalist or activist can now make a decent living while never once bothering to persuade a liberal. Telling people only what they want to hear has become a vocation. […….] Many liberals lived in such an ideological cocoon for decades, which is one reason conservatives won so many arguments early on. Having the right emulate that echo chamber helps no one.

Ironically, the institution in which conservatives had their greatest success is the one most besieged by conservatives today: the Republican party. To listen to many grassroots conservatives, the GOP establishment is a cabal of weak-kneed sellouts who regularly light votive candles to a poster of liberal Republican icon Nelson Rockefeller.

This is not only not true, it’s a destructive myth. The Rockefeller Republicans were purged from the GOP decades ago. Their high-water mark was in 1960, when the Goldwater insurgency was temporarily crushed. Richard Nixon agreed to run on a platform all but dictated by Rockefeller and to tap Rockefeller’s minion Henry Cabot Lodge as his running mate. When the forebears of today’s tea partiers threatened to stay home or bolt the party in 1960, Senator Barry Goldwater proclaimed, “Let’s grow up, conservatives!”

It’s still good advice. It’s not that the GOP isn’t conservative enough, it’s that it isn’t tactically smart or persuasive enough to move the rest of the nation in a more conservative direction. Moreover, thanks in part to the myth that all that stands between conservatives and total victory is a philosophically pure GOP, party leaders suffer from a debilitating lack of trust — some of it well earned — from the rank and file.

But politics is about persuasion, and a party consumed by the need to prove its purity to its base is going to have a very hard time proving anything else to the rest of the country.

Rodan Addendum: Republicans have a messaging problem

The Republican Party’s messaging is so bad, it could not even explain how to use a toilet seat. The cowardly Establishment wants the Progressive Media to accept it. Purists refuse to adapt to the electorate or accept new ideas.. This is pure dysfunction which enables the Obama Regime to run circles around the GOP.

The Republican party has a serious problem, and it’s not that the party isn’t conservative enough. The problem is that Americans are having a hard time understanding what we stand for and whom we represent. Put plainly, it is an identity crisis.

This identity crisis recently almost cost John Boehner his speakership. Those who voted against him — and those who planned to vote against him — did so because they feel that the GOP is being pushed in a direction that requires abandonment of their conservative principles. They went to Congress to defend these principles, not compromise them.

[….]

While many will argue that these deals were meant to ensure that Republicans would not be seen as “mean and nasty,” they destroyed Republican credibility. And herein lies the problem: Boehner is more concerned with the media’s perception of the party than with the actual integrity of the party’s philosophy.

Republicans like him are willing to be “Democrat-Lite” as long as they believe it will allow them to keep sitting at the table of power. However, this theory is counterproductive in the advancement of conservative principles — something the GOP should have learned in the Bush years of “compassionate conservatism,” when Bush and Cheney were no less vilified. Did they forget the pummeling we took in 2006 and 2008?

The national Republican Party needs message discipline and find a way to communicate directly to the American people.

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250 Responses to “The Republican party is ideologically sound — it’s just not very persuasive; Republicans have a messaging problem” ( jump to bottom )

Republicans need to hire a PR firm. Instead of having all these useless PACS, they should emulate OFA and start recruiting local people in communities that can persuade people to vote for them I also thing a name change is in order. Republican has become a scarlet letter.

There is no reason why Republican primaries should be open to non registered Republicans. Also there need to be runoffs if nobody gets 50% of the vote.

I agree, we need a runoff system. Also with regards to Presidential Primaries, Iowa and New Hampshire should NOT go first. Instead we should do a system of states from different geographic areas going on the same day.

I agree, we need a runoff system. Also with regards to Presidential Primaries, Iowa and New Hampshire should NOT go first. Instead we should do a system of states from different geographic areas going on the same day.

Iowa does not even vote Republican for president in the general election.

Republican has been around for 150+ years. If the Democrat Party could survive being the Party of the South in the Civil War, the Party of Segregation during Civil Rights, and the Party of Government at a time when spending is beyond out of control, the Republican Party can survive Bush. The problem is one, as you say, of messaging. It is also a problem with the culture, though. Low information voters hven’t yet begun to feel enough pain from their actions and the actions of government in their name to statrt to care enough to actually break out of the low information path. OWS is a perfect example. They were upset that they had worthless degrees, but instead of blaming (and maybe suing) the Colleges that have essentially defrauded them, they blame the businesses that won’t hire them because their degrees in trangendered studies are worthless. UNtil they hurt enough to begin learning, nothing will change with them. A paramicium quickly learns to flinch away from the needle, but low info voters aren’t generally as bright as a paamicium. They’re going to take a lot more pain to convince.

Republicans need to hire a PR firm. Instead of having all these useless PACS, they should emulate OFA and start recruiting local people in communities that can persuade people to vote for them I also thing a name change is in order. Republican has become a scarlet letter.

Matt Rhoades and Stuart Stevens were frankly incompetent nincompoops. Trying to suck up to the Rick Santorum loyalists cost him in the general election.

I am not the huge Rush Limbaugh fan that so many people here are but Limbaugh did say something prescient during the primaries when looking at the Romney ads attacking Gingrich he said “You can bet that he will never run those type of ads against Obama”.

I agree, we need a runoff system. Also with regards to Presidential Primaries, Iowa and New Hampshire should NOT go first. Instead we should do a system of states from different geographic areas going on the same day.

I think a lot of things are broken. For one the media was so in the bag for obama…how do you change that? Obama made sure this was a divided nation going into the election…and no matter how poorly obama did it didn’t change the minds of Americans voting for him. Right now I do believe we are dealing with a very unusual person…called obama….not sure how you defeat him ( and honestly that ship has sailed ..he got re-elected). Right now it is damage control and Congress is basically spine-less here especially with obama ruling by decree and EO’s and ignoring Congress all together. That is the reality we are dealing with now. We can’t change the last election. And the number one problem with the last election was obama. Plain and simple. Right now I would like to see someone standing up against him!!! It is getting to the point of insanity letting him run rogue and no one, not the press, not the different parts of government …no one is doing anything!

They were upset that they had worthless degrees, but instead of blaming (and maybe suing) the Colleges that have essentially defrauded them,

This is an issue Republicans should jump on. We should take on The Education Industrial Complex and push Community Colleges that teach skills. This is really a winning issue. The only one I see talking about this is Rubio.

lobo91 wrote:
@ Rodan:
The caucuses need to be done away with, as well. Especially in Iowa, where Obama showed how easy it is to game the system in 2008.
Yup, Caucuses allow the Dems to infiltrate and play Havoc.

In 2008, the Obama campaign bused people in from Illinois to take advantage of Iowa’s same-day voter registration. Those fraudulent voters were then able to swamp the caucuses and steal the state from Hillary Clinton.

A primary election is a party function and must be limited to only the membership of that party if it is to have any real merit in selecting the party’s candidate. With open primaries there really is no reason to have parties since an open primary is not a genuine party function.

Yes, you have to be willing to take the fight to the enemy to win. Romney left so much on the table that he didn’t have to. I think it was partially because he didn’t believe it. Take the gun control issue. People are now rightly concerned about what Barack Obama will do on the issue, but Romney made a point of not making a point of that before the election. Yes, he went and spoke to the NRA, and he gave a good speech, but what else did he do? He did the same with taxes. Obama ran on a platform of raising taxes. Romney should have made his appeal against the Tax-and-Spend Democrats. Such an appeal would have been factual, and might would have benefited not merely himself, but the down-ticket races where things were close. I could go on. Romney never fought against Obama half as hard as he fought against Perry or Gingrich. What is worse is that he never had any intention of doing so even while he was engaging in scorched earth tactics against his Republican rivals.

A primary election is a party function and must be limited to only the membership of that party if it is to have any real merit in selecting the party’s candidate. With open primaries there really is no reason to have parties since an open primary is not a genuine party function.

The worst situation is what they have in California, where there’s only 1 primary. The top two candidates go on the general election ballot.

The problem with Romney—and with Perry—was that they hired campaign consultants, and believed them and followed their advice.

I’ve said before, and will say again, that Perry should have shown up at the debates in a cowboy shirt and boots, and jeans, and gotten off a couple of yee-haws. He’d have been completely relaxed, would have come across as genuine, and would have wowed people simply because he wasn’t another blue-suited cipher.

Instead, he buckled himself physically and mentally into his Sunday-go-to-meetin’ suit, looked like an uncomfortable hired hand, and his brain shut down—because he followed his consultants’ advice to try and out-Romney Romney. So he went down in flames.

If Romney had hired Bill Whittle to run his campaign he would have trounced Obama. Whittle’s enunciation of Romney’s message was far better than anything Romney uttered. Romney ran a Cautious Campaign—and we can see how well that turned out.

It’s not a PR firm the Republicans need; they have to find their soul first. If they don’t, any money on PR is money thrown away, because they won’t know what to tell the PR firm to promote.

Romney never fought against Obama half as hard as he fought against Perry or Gingrich. What is worse is that he never had any intention of doing so even while he was engaging in scorched earth tactics against his Republican rivals

.

That was the problem with Romney. I did not see any Romney ads until late September here in Florida. The ones he ran were a joke. There is part of me that belives Tag Romney that his dad was not serious.

Speaking to someone who did vote for obama …..they said there was this huge uproar in obama’s first four years about him going for the 2nd Amendment and guess what he didn’t.
They didn’t see Fast and Furious for what it was and with obama failing in the first four years at his grab at the 2nd Amendment actually helped him get re-elected and be more successful at his grab for the guns.

Exactly. Fox is ONE Sunday morning show and it’s on cable. ABC, CBS, and NBC all have morning shows, on the channels people are watching on Sunday morning getting ready to watch sports. All you have to do is hear Bob Schieffer’s ridiculous, partisan comments after Obama’s Broadway Show yesterday to see why there will never be honest debate on the networks.

In case you missed it, Schieffer compared Obama going after the NRA to getting the Nazi’s in WWII and the killing of Osama bin Laden – more specically, as something it should be easier for him to do.

Tell them the same thing I tell anyone who informs me that guns shouldn’t be allowed and the Second Amendment should be repealed. “Put a big “This Home is Gun Free” sign in front of your house tonight when you get home. Because that is exactly what would happen.”

I don’t know what it is about libturds that they harbor the ridiculous belief that criminals buy them at Cabellas and Bass Pro Shop like the rest of us.

Iron Fist knows how to get the base motivated, I know how to get Hispanics, Asians over and Younger voters, Speranza can get Independents and Urban/Suburban Voters and Lobo can get Military/Gun Right type. Buzzsaw can provide messaging advise.

Police are investigating reports a gang claiming to be Islamic vigilantes have been confronting members of the public and demanding they give up alcohol and women cover their flesh in their ‘Muslim area’.

The Republicans don’t seem to understand the value of propaganda. The Left certainly does. That is how you go after the low information voters. You have to connect with them emotionally, because they aren’t going to waste a minutethinking about things. You need to stay factual. The MFM will eat a Republican who lies alive (Democrats, of course, get a pass on this one), but if they can’t debate your facts, they are pushed back to relying on “common sense”, which means “Agree with me, or you are a poopyhead!” Sure, that’ll still appeal to some of those low info voters, but emphasize how it is Obama coming after their rights. How it is Obama that raised their taxes. How it is Obama economic policies that have them unemployed. And do so constantly. One of my biggest gripes with the GOP is that they act like these “games” are beneath them. It’s called politics, goddamnit. If you don’t want to fight to win, get out of the way.

Amazing, isn’t it – the ACLU is all about the people, but they don’t get that the NRA is just as much a civil rights organization. Probably better, since they aren’t trying to INFRINGE on Second Amendment rights.

@ Lily:
Exactly. Fox is ONE Sunday morning show and it’s on cable. ABC, CBS, and NBC all have morning shows, on the channels people are watching on Sunday morning getting ready to watch sports. All you have to do is hear Bob Schieffer’s ridiculous, partisan comments after Obama’s Broadway Show yesterday to see why there will never be honest debate on the networks.
In case you missed it, Schieffer compared Obama going after the NRA to getting the Nazi’s in WWII and the killing of Osama bin Laden — more specically, as something it should be easier for him to do.

The sad part is that people are behind whatever is being force fed to them!! Not sure how one combats this. But I don’t think more sound bites or better campaigning by the Republicans in the last election would have helped. For one if you didn’t know by September how horrific obama was as a president….nothing is going to change your mind. If people REALLY want to keep going over WHY the Republicans lost the last election they need to honestly ask an obama voter why they voted for obama!!!! The answers are all over the place and nothing and I mean nothing was going to change their mind about voting for obama! They defend the man like he was their flesh and blood. They defend with more vigor and passion than their own belief in God! It really is insane.

I don’t know what it is about libturds that they harbor the ridiculous belief that criminals buy them at Cabellas and Bass Pro Shop like the rest of us.

Instead of picking them up from their coke dealer or stealing them, which is where criminals really get their guns. The Left know this, though. They are simply hoping that the low info voters they rely on don’t know it or don’t care.

@ Lily:
Tell them the same thing I tell anyone who informs me that guns shouldn’t be allowed and the Second Amendment should be repealed. “Put a big “This Home is Gun Free” sign in front of your house tonight when you get home. Because that is exactly what would happen.”
I don’t know what it is about libturds that they harbor the ridiculous belief that criminals buy them at Cabellas and Bass Pro Shop like the rest of us.

The thing is they thought it was all propaganda that obama wanted to go after our guns. They didn’t believe what they didn’t want to believe. It’s bizarre. Now that obama has made a huge and public power grab…at first they refused to believe that obama was going to go around Congress with EO’s…then they went with “I’d freely give up my right to guns if it saves one child.” This is plain insanity. They have no idea they are vomiting forth something that Hitler said back in the day.

The RNC should hire people on this blog for their next campaign
Iron Fist knows how to get the base motivated, I know how to get Hispanics, Asians over and Younger voters, Speranza can get Independents and Urban/Suburban Voters and Lobo can get Military/Gun Right type. Buzzsaw can provide messaging advise.
But it will never happen!

Obama’s big problem with his gun grabber game plan is that the NRA is not your average organization that gives a crap what the media thinks about them or whether they will get invitations to the cocktail parties. Obama thought that if they came out “guns blazing” against in NRA in the hours and days after Newtown, the country would do what it always does when Odumbo speaks ex cathedra – he and the rest of the proggie jerks were surprised when the reverse happened.

He’s bitten off more than he knows how to chew with the NRA. He has a real problem dealing with opposition – look at the way he whined and sniffled about the TEA Party. And the NRA is not just an opposition group like the TEA Party – they’re the TEA Party on steroids.

It’d be interesting, and couldn’t be worse than what they have in place now. But you have to have the right candidates. The Republicans too often go with the wrong candidate. While you give the Tea PArty down the road for Sharon Angle and Christine O’Donnell, they were also responsible for Marco Rubio and Rand Paul. Rubio especially was supposed to get out of the way for prima donna and turn coat Charlie Crist. Mike Castle n Delaware would have been no better than whatever Democrat they actually elected. He’d have just been in the Senate to give a “bi-partisan” veneer to Obama’s gun control inititives.

Obama thought that if they came out “guns blazing” against in NRA in the hours and days after Newtown, the country would do what it always does when Odumbo speaks ex cathedra — he and the rest of the proggie jerks were surprised when the reverse happened.

The NRA’s strategy of remaining silent for the first week was brilliant. They just sat back and watched the left become more and more shrill.

While you give the Tea Party down the road for Sharon Angle and Christine O’Donnell, they were also responsible for Marco Rubio and Rand Paul.

Actually I don’t blame the Tea Party for Angle and O’Donnell. They were NOT Tea Party candidates. They were Rick Santorum/Mike Huckabee candidates. I am convinced they were Democrat plants along with Todd Akins.

I do not like the Tommy Thompson type candidates either. We need more Marco Rubio, Rand Paul and Pat Toomey types as candidates.

Carolina Girl wrote:
I don’t know what it is about libturds that they harbor the ridiculous belief that criminals buy them at Cabellas and Bass Pro Shop like the rest of us.
Instead of picking them up from their coke dealer or stealing them, which is where criminals really get their guns. The Left know this, though. They are simply hoping that the low info voters they rely on don’t know it or don’t care.

The type of people who support taking away guns for the good of the country will never look at this issue with critical thinking. They think it is their RIGHT TO KNOW WHETHER OR NOT YOU HAVE A GUN IN YOUR HOUSE. They refuse to believe that it isn’t the people who actually FOLLOW THE LAWS that aren’t the problem. They twist themselves in knots to make sure they don’t even think about the people who own guns illegally that are the problem. You can tell them that you can pass a million laws about guns but it isn’t going to solve the problem because the people you don’t want to have guns are not going to obey the law to begin with.

If you want your rights you’ll have to have a background check
If you want your rights you’ll have to have a background check
If you want your rights you’ll have to have a background check
If you want your rights you’ll have to have a background check
If you want your rights you’ll have to have a background check

We need to purge the Santorum Theocrat Socialist wing of the GOP. I am not talking about Social Conservatives, I am talking about people using Social issues to advance Socialism in the name of the family. Rubio and Jindal are Socially Conservatives, but they are not Socialists like Huckabee and Santorum.

I make huge distinction between some who is Pro Free Market/Individual Liberty but Socially Conservative as opposed to someone who appears Socially Conservative, but their economic policies are Socialist.

@ Lily:
Obama’s big problem with his gun grabber game plan is that the NRA is not your average organization that gives a crap what the media thinks about them or whether they will get invitations to the cocktail parties. Obama thought that if they came out “guns blazing” against in NRA in the hours and days after Newtown, the country would do what it always does when Odumbo speaks ex cathedra — he and the rest of the proggie jerks were surprised when the reverse happened.
He’s bitten off more than he knows how to chew with the NRA. He has a real problem dealing with opposition — look at the way he whined and sniffled about the TEA Party. And the NRA is not just an opposition group like the TEA Party — they’re the TEA Party on steroids.

Oh indeed!!! Already the progressives are trying to make fun of the NRA. They have no concept of what the 2nd Amendment is all about. (Trust me I have had to listen to what they believe in ..in person here lately). They think it is outlandish that people are buying guns up like crazy. The honestly believe whatever obama says…obama said he isn’t going to take away our guns!!!!! So why are people worried about it???????????? They go right down the line to “it’s for the children”. Really? I ask? Let’s remove every gun and every bullet off the face of the earth and guess what? You haven’t reduced crime..nope. You haven’t reduced wars….nope. You have reduced accidents either…nope. You haven’t changed a thing except possibly the way people will kill you. Trust me you cannot break through the wall of ignorance concerning this issue. At all! And yes BLAME THE MEDIA and BLAME THE PEOPLE FOR BEING SO DAMN FOOLISH TO BELIEVE THE BULLSH*T TOO! It really is incredible.

What’s odd for me is that so many of the “socially conservative” viewpoints are shared with minorities. Abortion and gay marriage are not supported by Hispanics and Blacks do not support gay marriage or amnesty for illegals. I explained to a Black friend of my son’s once that no, I don’t believe in Affirmative Action – why? Because that’s like saying to a race of people – “you’re inferior and you can’t succeed unless we dumb it all down for you.”

What’s odd for me is that so many of the “socially conservative” viewpoints are shared with minorities.

The Republicans do not do outreach. If I was in charge of outreach I can easily get Hispanics and some Blacks to hate White Democrats. That is the way to win them. Make them resent the White Hipsters living good while they live as dirt. The GOP keeps wanting to grab more White Democrats, that is their big mistake. Divide and conquer.

@ Rodan:
It’d be interesting, and couldn’t be worse than what they have in place now. But you have to have the right candidates. The Republicans too often go with the wrong candidate. While you give the Tea PArty down the road for Sharon Angle and Christine O’Donnell, they were also responsible for Marco Rubio and Rand Paul. Rubio especially was supposed to get out of the way for prima donna and turn coat Charlie Crist. Mike Castle n Delaware would have been no better than whatever Democrat they actually elected. He’d have just been in the Senate to give a “bi-partisan” veneer to Obama’s gun control inititives.

Yes but Castle would have been one more Republican needed to take back the Senate and turn Harry Reid into Senate Minority leader.

unclassifiable wrote:
@ Rodan:
Are you a GOP Precinct captian?
I actually thought of doing that, but the GOP is very dysfunctional. They provide no support and honestly I do not have time. The Democrats are organized, the GOP is not.

But when I tried to get into GOP politics in Texas this is where you start. You have to put in the time and the money before people even start to notice you.

There are extrodinary circumstances. Public figures and big donors are fast tracked. The Tea Party obviously has its own gravitas with in the party but is IMHO still considered on the outside looking in.

But when I tried to get into GOP politics in Texas this is where you start. You have to put in the time and the money before people even start to notice you.

This is part of the problem. The Democrats fund their precinct captains and pay for expenses. The GOP does not. Each Precinct captain is left on their own. Look at OFA, it’s funny funded and people are paid. There is no GOP equivalent.

The problem is at the national level where the GOP needs a coherent message. A precinct captain can have great ideas, but if the party message is not the same as what a captain speaks then it becomes inconsistent.

Furthermore al along the way there are test of party “compliance”. Here in Texas there was great pressure to agree to a whole slate of social points. If you ever want to know why someone changes a position it usually is an exchange for gaining power.

It is a damn slimy process and I was only seeing it on the GOP side. From the Dem side I probably couldn’t look at myself in the mirror in the morning after a meeting.

I think your not seeing the full exchange. They may fund the captains but you are not going to be one for long if you don’t put in the time and the Dems have a special emphasis on locking down votes. The GOP has been likened in that respect to herding cats.

And you see this really goes down to a personality issue. Conservatives tend to be rather independent creatures who have politics second to running a business or profession. Dems tend to have politics as there profession. That is a difficult paradigm to crack.

That takes money that the party doesn’t have. For all the talk about the GOP being the Party of the Rich, most of the rich side with the Democrats. Money isn’t as big a concern for the Democrat Party. Too, they have big money donors in the Unions, who extort the money for the donations from their members. The GOP lacks these sources of funds.

Two handguns and two pistol permits were stolen from the New City home of a man whose name and address are listed on the website of a local newspaper as possessing gun permits, police said.

The thieves ransacked the house Wednesday night, breaking into two safes on the home’s third floor and stealing a third safe. The guns were in the stolen safe, police said.

The burglary comes less than a week after a White Plains homeowner who, too, was listed on the Journal News website as having gun permits, arrived home to find his home burglarized with jewelry missing and an attempted break-in of his gun safe. The thieves were not successful and no guns were stolen.

The Journal News has come under fire from elected officials and police groups for posting the interactive map Dec. 23 that showed the names and addresses of all legal gun permit holders in Westchester and Rockland counties.

You are ignoring the most significant part of the post but perhaps I need to explain it further.

Democrats beleive that government is a profession. Conservatives beleive it is a service.

This has everything to do with Democrats having a totalitarian impulse to involve government in every aspect of our lives. Conservatives do not beleive that.

In other words the funding pattern is very much entwined in the belief sets.

In order to have it your way you would be better served trying to change the Democratic party from the inside. But in that case you are now faced with the mirror issue from the GOP — you will have a bunch of party members expecting to make a long and prosperous living from a successful campaign and you will be faced with telling them not to expect that. You won’t get far.

Buried in the state’s new anti-gun law, retired officers — like the general public — are restricted to only seven bullets in an ammo clip.

Police officers, federal agents, prison guards, state police and other members of law enforcement are already clamoring for an amendment to the law to allow the state’s 100,000 retired officers to keep 10 and 15-bullet magazines for their guns, insisting they need the extra firepower should they ever confront a Newtown, Conn., situation.

Technically, any retired cop with more than seven bullets in a clip would be in violation of the law.

“As a law enforcement officer for over 20 years, I understand the importance of instituting a new policy on mandating the limits of bullets that a regular citizen can possess, but as a matter of fact
the bad guys are not going to follow this law,” said Norman Seabrook, president of the correction officers union, the city’s second largest.

“The way the current legislation is drafted, it actually handcuffs the law enforcement community from having the necessary ammunition needed to save lives,” he said. “We must not allow this to happen.

”

Uhhmmmm…..yeah

No concerns about the average citizen’s need for necessary ammunition to save their or their family’s lives?

Instead of the Super PACS, the GOP donors should focus on infrastructure. They spent close to 1 billion and still lost. If they had invested 200 million in building infrastructure, the election might have turned out different. The Democrats do have a money advantage, but the GOP could change where they spend their money.

I get your point and you are right, but if the GOP is to win elections, then they will need to get people who will dedicate their lives to the party. That means paying people full time. Conservatives need a change in attitude.

In order to have it your way you would be better served trying to change the Democratic party from the inside.

They are Marxist, Black Nazis, Globalists and White Supremacists and Hipsters. I oppose their ideology and would never vote nor work for them.

@ heysoos:
I like the way he says that he “understands” why we have to limit what law-abiding people can have, while acknowledging that it will have absolutely no effect on criminals in the same sentence.

yeah, everything is so convoluted with these people it’s stunning…it’s just mindless babble…no point in even talking to them, just mock their illogical stupidity

@ unclassifiable:
I get your point and you are right, but if the GOP is to win elections, then they will need to get people who will dedicate their lives to the party. That means paying people full time. Conservatives need a change in attitude.
In order to have it your way you would be better served trying to change the Democratic party from the inside.
They are Marxist, Black Nazis, Globalists and White Supremacists and Hipsters. I oppose their ideology and would never vote nor work for them.

Alan West has a new partnership with PJTV that has some interesting ideas. Saw it when watching Alonzo Rachels newest show. (Alonzo also has a show almost custom made for you, I think you’ll enjoy it.)

If I get the time I’ll put all the info up on a thread with some of the videos.

unclassifiable wrote:
@ lobo91:
Maybe I am not in the majority here but shouldn’t folks have their guns locked in a gun safe when thay are away from home?
That person’s guns were in a safe. They stole the safe, too.

next EO…
you must own a federally approved gun safe, installed in a permanent concrete bunker….hahaha!….it just goes on forever

Gee…who could’ve seen this coming?
Second Home That Was Listed On NY Newspaper’s Map Of Gun Owners Broken Into, Thieves Steal Two Guns…
Two handguns and two pistol permits were stolen from the New City home of a man whose name and address are listed on the website of a local newspaper as possessing gun permits, police said.
The thieves ransacked the house Wednesday night, breaking into two safes on the home’s third floor and stealing a third safe. The guns were in the stolen safe, police said.
The burglary comes less than a week after a White Plains homeowner who, too, was listed on the Journal News website as having gun permits, arrived home to find his home burglarized with jewelry missing and an attempted break-in of his gun safe. The thieves were not successful and no guns were stolen.
The Journal News has come under fire from elected officials and police groups for posting the interactive map Dec. 23 that showed the names and addresses of all legal gun permit holders in Westchester and Rockland counties.
Hopefully, this paper will be sued out of existence.

@ heysoos:
next EO…
you must own a federally approved gun safe, installed in a permanent concrete bunker….hahaha!….it just goes on forever
Some idiot Dem is trying to get that passed in NJ. It’s part of the same bill that would mandate psychological testing to buy a gun.

Mars wrote:
Taking it directly to the youth instead of relying on the old methods is definitely a good first step.
Quite concur! I am tired of the “Let’s wait until they turn 40 before they are receptive towards Republican ideas” game.

unclassifiable wrote:
@ lobo91:
Maybe I am not in the majority here but shouldn’t folks have their guns locked in a gun safe when thay are away from home?
How someone secures their guns is up to them, and depends on their circumstances.
If there are people in the home that you need to keep from getting ahold of them, then yes, a safe is a good idea.
I don’t necessarily think that people should be required to buy a safe on the off chance that someone might break into their house, though. That’s why we put locks on our doors.

Currently I sleep in front of the front door with my gun 3 feet away. My ammo is 3.1 feet away. Trigger lock key is 2.9 feet away somewhere it would never be found. I am able to unlock my case and gun in about 15 seconds.

Yet my kids have no idea where any of it is. They’ve been shown it, explained how it works, and at the age of 12 both will be trained with it.

@ unclassifiable:
no big deal….a good safe can be very expensive…most big dogs own them

If you have a big collection of guns, it’s probably worth getting a good safe. But you can’t very well tell someone that they have to spend a couple thousand dollars on a half-ton safe to lock up one $400 gun.

heysoos wrote:
@ unclassifiable:
no big deal….a good safe can be very expensive…most big dogs own them
If you have a big collection of guns, it’s probably worth getting a good safe. But you can’t very well tell someone that they have to spend a couple thousand dollars on a half-ton safe to lock up one $400 gun.

This is why we gun nuts have slogans like “Gun control is not about guns, it’s about control.”

People need to quit chasing the shiny object.

If politicians were serious about crime/criminals, there would be tougher sentences for offenders.

I have a lock on the doors to my house. That SHOULD be enough, but I know it isn’t, so I have safes, too. That SHOULD be enough, but there are some places that require trigger locks on top of all that. It’s crap.

Second Home That Was Listed On NY Newspaper’s Map Of Gun Owners Broken Into, Thieves Steal Two Guns…

Two handguns and two pistol permits were stolen from the New City home of a man whose name and address are listed on the website of a local newspaper as possessing gun permits, police said.

The thieves ransacked the house Wednesday night, breaking into two safes on the home’s third floor and stealing a third safe. The guns were in the stolen safe, police said.

The burglary comes less than a week after a White Plains homeowner who, too, was listed on the Journal News website as having gun permits, arrived home to find his home burglarized with jewelry missing and an attempted break-in of his gun safe. The thieves were not successful and no guns were stolen.

The Journal News has come under fire from elected officials and police groups for posting the interactive map Dec. 23 that showed the names and addresses of all legal gun permit holders in Westchester and Rockland counties.

Hopefully, this paper will be sued out of existence.

This is one case where I would fully support those ambulance chasing lawyers that advertise on TV. Seems it should be readily demonstrable that the newspaper enabled these crimes.

That LGF would go anti Israel was predictable.
You can’t have all of those Lefies congregate and
not have that happen.

back during the last Battle Of Gaza we lived blog the video cam and hooted every time there was gunfire or bombs going off…that was fun and most people were into it…there was a rooster somewhere that crowed away and we all loved him, he was our mascot

I didn’t care less what he had to say…it was his bad attitude, his vulgarity, and his penchant for instantly attacking people…so one day I stepped in and off we went….he was so easy to defeat, because he was out of control…I’d mildly point that out to him in a friendly way and BOOM! off he’d go again…you could set him up like a bowling pin

lobo91 wrote:
@ unclassifiable:
I certainly don’t have a problem with people having gun safes.
I just don’t think they should be made mandatory.
Agree!

The point of laws that require things like that (or psychological testing) isn’t to keep guns away from bad people, anyway. It’s to throw up so many roadblocks in the path of people who want to legally own a gun that they decide it’s not worth it.

Scenario – Young lady comes home at the end of the day. She has locked her gun in a safe of some sort. Just after she gets in the house and before she has a chance to do more than take off her coat and put down her purse, two thugs bust in, beat the shit out of her, take turns raping her for a while, stangle her to death, steal all here stuff. Her body is found 3 days later.

Want to rethink that crap about being required to keep your gun in a safe? Which Heller already declared unconstitutional anyway?

@ lobo91:
It’s to throw up so many roadblocks in the path of people who want to legally own a gun that they decide it’s not worth it.
Exactly, it’s to prevent people from exercising their right to own a gun.

I think we should propose a law that people have to buy liability insurance before they can comment online.

There have been kids who have committed suicide as a result of things people have posted about them, after all.

there were many ambivalent posters back then regarding Israel, just not up to speed…then they saw the tapes of Hamas tossing people off the highrise after they took, and it blew people away…yes, these are the animals that Israel has to deal with and they were shocked…along with stuff such as Buzz’s history and whatnot, they became enthusiastic Israel supported…but that’s all gone now

lobo91 wrote:
It’s to throw up so many roadblocks in the path of people who want to legally own a gun that they decide it’s not worth it.
Which is unconstitutional when applied to any other Constitutional right. Will it be ruled unconstitutional in regards to the Second Amendment? I don’t know. Time will tell.

when the SC folds it’s over bro…if you need a fallback zone, I welcome you to New Mexico

Oh, I’ve no doubt. And everyone should file an INDIVIDUAL action and force them the file motion after motion for consolidation. I predict their legal fees will be in the millions within a couple months. If they have an error and omissions carrier, I have a feeling they’ll issue a reservation of rights letter, write a check for policy limits (and I’ll bet you the limits aren’t that high) and tell them “you’re on your own.”

That LGF would go anti Israel was predictable.
You can’t have all of those Lefies congregate and
not have that happen.
back during the last Battle Of Gaza we lived blog the video cam and hooted every time there was gunfire or bombs going off…that was fun and most people were into it…there was a rooster somewhere that crowed away and we all loved him, he was our mascot

@ heysoos:
You just knew that LGF would not remain pro Israel.
Some people thought that they could join in the hard left party & still
maintain support for Israel on the blog.

So many lefties, it was impossible to remain sympathetic towards Israel Charles Johnson for the most part kept his mouth shut but he allowed his posters to trash the Jewish nation constantly lead by mental midgets such as icejimmah and jamesfirecat.

@ heysoos:
You just knew that LGF would not remain pro Israel.
Some people thought that they could join in the hard left party & still
maintain support for Israel on the blog.

So many lefties, it was impossible to remain sympathetic towards Israel Charles Johnson for the most part kept his mouth shut but he allowed his posters to trash the Jewish nation constantly lead by mental midgets such as icejimmah and jamesfirecat.

By his very silence Charles was complicit. He got all pissy with
people over lesser things.

@ heysoos:
You just knew that LGF would not remain pro Israel.
Some people thought that they could join in the hard left party & still
maintain support for Israel on the blog.

a few short years ago I got sick and had to have 10 surgeries at the UNM Hospital…my route there (about 100 times) took me past a section of campus where the Israel haters hung out on every corner, chanting and bleating…my blood would boil…this free Palestine, Israeli apartheid shit really burns me…liberals need to stay far away from me…I’d rather be mugged by the Crips…at 60 years old, the only enemies I have are liberals, and trust me…they are my dire enemy

lobo91 wrote:
It’s to throw up so many roadblocks in the path of people who want to legally own a gun that they decide it’s not worth it.
Which is unconstitutional when applied to any other Constitutional right. Will it be ruled unconstitutional in regards to the Second Amendment? I don’t know. Time will tell.

These type of suggestions come from people who lie through their teeth saying requiring photo ID to vote is racist and an attempt to intimidate minorities to not vote.

Had I the time and money, I would file suit against Cuomo and the leaders of the New York State legislature to have Cuomo’s new gun-grab law ruled unconstitutional.

The basis of the suit would be the 7-bullet magazine limit. It is my understanding that 8 bullets are the standard capacity for a basic magazine, and have been for some time. Requiring a 7-bullet limit places a chilling effect on my Second Amendment rights: insofar as the Second Amendment sets forth a fundamental right, and there is no compelling state interest in reducing magazine size in this way for legally-owned weapons, the law must fall.

Ordinary state laws must satisfy a “rational basis test”—there need only be a “rational basis” for the state’s actions for the law to stand. But a fundamental right requires the state to satisfy the much-more-difficult “strict scrutiny” which mandates that the state demonstrate a “compelling state interest.”

There is no compelling state interest here. There is no great upswing in gun misuse—indeed, gun violence is down in New York. There is no reason for the state to make it more difficult for law-abiding citizens to own firearms. I do not believe that the New York law could satisfy the “rational basis test,” given that it was enacted in haste in the course of a full-on Chicken Little sky-is-falling panic—transparently for the purpose of furthering Governor Cuomo’s presidential ambitions. For that matter, Cuomo’s unhinged ranting that “you don’t need ten bullets to kill a deer” in and of itself demonstrates that there is no rational basis for this law, as the Second Amendment does not protect a constitutional right to venison.

@ lobo91:
Hey what about journalist?
I mean if anyone has been responsible for writing false information that has gotten other people killed it has to be them right?
I am sure we could find many,many,many,many,many,many, many,many,many,many,many,many, many,many,many,many,many,many, many,many,many,many,many,many, many,many,many,many,many,many, many,many,many,many,many,many, many,many,many,many,many,many, many,many,many,many,many,many, many,many,many,many,many,many, many,many,many,many,many,many…
…examples.

Using the same arguments the left makes on guns you could limit reporters free speech just on the number of school shootings directly tied to their eternal reporting of Columbine and it’s anniversaries.

Police officers, federal agents, prison guards, state police and other members of law enforcement are already clamoring for an amendment to the law to allow the state’s 100,000 retired officers to keep 10 and 15-bullet magazines for their guns, insisting they need the extra firepower should they ever confront a Newtown, Conn., situation.

Just realized that this is New York, where police require 15 rounds to get one hit. Now it makes sense.

lobo91 wrote:
There’s no single “standard capacity” for magazines. It depends on the gun.
Well, then, I’d need a consultant.
I still say, however, that there is no rational basis for this law—and it certainly does not satisfy strict scrutiny.

That fact actually makes it worse. It’s just a random number they picked out of the air.

Just like the ten round limit that Obama wants. It’s just a number that sounds right to the gun controllers. Something to sound reasonable to the low information voters who don’t know any better. They’d make it a oneround limit if they thought they could sell it to the rubes. It is all just a prelude to confiscation, if they can get there.

buzzsawmonkey wrote:
lobo91 wrote:
There’s no single “standard capacity” for magazines. It depends on the gun.
Well, then, I’d need a consultant.
I still say, however, that there is no rational basis for this law—and it certainly does not satisfy strict scrutiny.
That fact actually makes it worse. It’s just a random number they picked out of the airass.

Typical semi-auto pistol magazines range from 6 to 17 rounds. There are a lot of 10 round magazines in circulation for guns that will actually accept larger ones, because they were mandated during the “assault weapon ban” era, and several states still have that limit (like NJ and CA).

@ citizen_q:
Police officers, federal agents, prison guards, state police and other members of law enforcement are already clamoring for an amendment to the law to allow the state’s 100,000 retired officers to keep 10 and 15-bullet magazines for their guns, insisting they need the extra firepower should they ever confront a Newtown, Conn., situation.

Just realized that this is New York, where police require 15 rounds to get one hit. Now it makes sense.

they need more range time, but BO fucked them out of the ammo…so it’s more pole time instead

It would be hilarious to do an “Eastern” instead of a Western; take the plot of a Western and transfer it to some sleepy little Middle Eastern town, with the new sheriff going up against the local al Qaeda brigands.

Use all the cliches of the Western, including the final gun-battle showdown (with backshooters, of course) in the main street of the town.

Scenario — Young lady comes home at the end of the day. She has locked her gun in a safe of some sort. Just after she gets in the house and before she has a chance to do more than take off her coat and put down her purse, two thugs bust in, beat the shit out of her, take turns raping her for a while, stangle her to death, steal all here stuff. Her body is found 3 days later.

Want to rethink that crap about being required to keep your gun in a safe? Which Heller already declared unconstitutional anyway?

The Gun Safe like any other tool has to be used correctly to be effective. This unfortunate young Lady was not using her gun safe correctly. This unfortunate scenario can be avoided in the future by simply educating young Ladies on the basics of gun safe safety.

Well, that shows that I know almost as little about guns as the President and most of the major news media, doesn’t it?

In the meantime, the fact that many standard magazines routinely hold more than 7 rounds merely bolsters my point—that the arbitrary and capricious limit imposed by New York has no rational basis, let alone compelling state interest, behind it, and that as such it is an unconstitutional chill on my fundamental rights.

Well, that shows that I know almost as little about guns as the President and most of the major news media, doesn’t it?

In the meantime, the fact that many standard magazines routinely hold more than 7 rounds merely bolsters my point—that the arbitrary and capricious limit imposed by New York has no rational basis, let alone compelling state interest, behind it, and that as such it is an unconstitutional chill on my fundamental rights.

The big difference is that you’re will to learn, the others, not so much…

Guess I am a bit of a Luddite. Or maybe its a combination of my IT background and growing mistrust of government, but I don’t trust that the votes I cast via electronic ballot are actually counted.
Maybe I just need a better tin-foil hat.